The Concubine (10 page)

***

My vision blurs and I lean against the tapestry depicting some random battle fought by the first Devlar monarchs; I knew this only because I remembered the week so long ago when I was first brought to this palace, and I was made to kneel before you and swear my allegiance, right at this very spot. I must trek on, no matter how much blood pours from my veins, I must make sure that this mission I have started be properly finished. Lucian must know that war will solve nothing and could only bring out thousands of senseless deaths. 
I am almost crawling up the endless staircase, vaguely wondering why the halls were so empty. At the very least, Lucian’s soldiers should have been stationed at every corner. I collapse unexpectedly in fatigue and dehydration.  My eyes flutter shut, my pulse thrums erratically through my veins, and my heart follows in its own unsteady beats as darkness envelops me, taking me back to my solitary tomb.

***

“Mama?” Angel hands, soft and gentle against my face coax me to rise. “Mama sleeping?”
 

“Oh sweet, boy!” I wrap one arm around him, bringing him to my chest. My lips are in his hair, showering him with kisses. His giggles are infectious and I wallow in his innocent joy.
“Do not overexert yourself.” Lucian’s voice cautions softly from the foot of the bed and I visibly stiffen.
“Come little prince, your Mama needs her rest.”
“NO!” my hold tightens, my voice shrill. “Please let him stay.”
“The current state of your health concerns and I will not allow anything to disrupt it.” He comes around the side of the bed, his face revealing nothing while those blue eyes narrow on me and I shudder, chilled by the frostiness of that gaze.

“He is my child.” I glare at him and tighten my hold on Liam. 
“Take the boy to the nursery, Hasa.” Hasa, an obedient little maid makes her way to me and hesitantly holds out her arms; I vigorously shake my head and keep Liam to my chest.
“Give him willingly or I will forcibly remove him from you.”
“Please…Lucian…” 
“Take him.” He orders once more and this time as she reaches for Liam I reluctantly relinquish my hold and give him off into her care.
“Lucian, I came to ask…” I manage to say into the pregnant silence, but he quickly interrupts me.
“Did the children see him?” 
“Yes.” 
“Do they know the truth?” 
“Yes.”
“Did you sleep with him?”
“Lucian…”
“Did you?” His roar causes me to jump, while my heart thunders painfully in my chest.

“It does not matter!”

The moment I say the words, I wish them back as he reels on me so fast that I am left stunned. On the bed, cornered by his surmountable weight he takes my arms in his grasp and shakes me. “It does not matter?” he shakes me so hard that my teeth rattle. “It does not matter?” a resounding slap to my face I bite down on my tongue from the blow, blood flooding my mouth.
“It Matters! You stupid little whore! How could you have allowed such foolishness to happen? How could you willingly allow yourself to be fucked by that loathsome bastard? My wife!” the covers where immediately yanked off my person, leaving me utterly exposed to his wrathful, malevolent stare.
“This!” he pressed his fingers against the mark on higher most part of my thigh. “This marks you as mine! How could you have betrayed me!” a sense of déjà vu washed over me and I cynically ponder at the price only mortal men could set on my flesh. 
“How could I have betrayed you when I never belonged to you to begin with?” my personal battles with these two possessive men it seems always takes place on bed; how truly fortunate for me.
He looks at me with a look of utter betrayal. “You don’t love me?” 
“I love, Marik. Marik is my king, he is my master and he owns every last inch of my being. He is my soul mate, destined to be together for lifetimes to come. We will always find each other, no matter the distance because he and I are one.” the realization has just hit me, the truth of the words I speak a testament to what I feel, what I have felt. You are my everything, Marik and I know that I have loved you before just as I know I will love you again, in another time, in another place, we will always love again.
His laughter when it begins is maniacal and bone chilling. He alights from the bed and pinions me with his stare. “Well then, if that is how it is to be than I am afraid I will have to kill you.” He says it so easily, as though discussing the weather and I fear him in that moment because I know he means it.
“If I cannot have you, then he won’t either. I promise you, he will never lay his filthy hands on you again!” When he leaves me, I wonder whether this is how my story will end.
 

***

I am entirely too weary, my love. I have not lived long, yet I feel as though I have lived many lifetimes in a span of a few short years. I was born into slavery. I have known nothing else but the dictates of powerful men, always leading me around on the leash that bound me to their laws. You were not my first lover, my King, but you are my only. You are the only one who holds my heart captive and with you I have known the sweet pleasures of the flesh. I known misery, I have known happiness. With you Marik I have learned love, and amassed limitless patience. With you I have fathered two beautiful boys and another with your enemy, but my love for them is unmeasured. Through my short life, I have gained wisdom, I have sinned and I have repented and if I were to forfeit that life today, know that it will not be in vain. 
As I awake this morning I am overcome with a wave of serenity I have not felt in forever. I have never felt this haunting calm that even now grips my bones with unrelenting sweetness. I have had another dream and in it I was naked in the middle of a verdant field. The wind whistling, its breath tenderly warm against my naked flesh. And then the storming clouds above my head opened up and rained. On me the heavens bleed, actual blood rained in pellets down on me and as I lifted my head and stuck out my hand it suddenly became clear to me. The chilling darkness from my daydream yesterday, last evening’s downpour of blood in my dreams and finally the erratic feelings of foreboding that has followed me like a dark cloud until now, all signified something. Today or maybe sometime soon my life will be forfeit and Lucian will be the one to snuff it out. But before that occurs, something miraculous will happen and you, Marik, will live on with our children, you will regain your kingdom back and all will be right. 
I know the time has come, even before the palace shakes with the countless blast of canons that has been bombarding the palace walls since this morning. The war has begun and now it is time for me to be taken away. I am escorted to the parapet of the palace, between two hulking soldiers who will not live to see this battle out. Archers lined the walls, hidden away ready for another signal to attack. I am brought to stand inches behind Lucian, with his back to me he faces out into the horizon. Like avengers of the apocalypse, I am able to see the endless rows of thousands of men who make up your army and my heart stutters for a moment. 
 

***

“Tell me something,” Lucian’s voice is devoid of emotion as he speaks. “Do you love our son as much as you love his?” 
 

“More than life itself.” He turns around then and I feel my knees buckle as I see Liam standing at his knees holding onto his toy bear. 
As if sensing the exact second I decide to move, Lucian signals for the guards at my side to curtail my actions and I slowly shake my head as a sick sense of dread produces bile and it crawls to my throat, bitter and acrid.

“Mama.” Liam reaches for me, his little arms outstretched, a gentle smile graces his lips and I look into his eyes, beautiful eyes, innocent eyes and I openly weep. 
Lucian scoops up Liam as another blast rocks the palace; only a few more and it will crumble beneath us. 
“He looks so much like me,” he quietly whispers as he runs his hands through Liam’s shoulder length locks. “A perfect little replica of his papa. I wanted us to be a family, we could’ve been a happy family.” his eyes lift to my own wet ones. “I could’ve made you happy.” 
“Lucian please don’t do this.” I beseech him, wanting with desperation to take my son from him.  
“Do you know what made me happy?” he continues. “Knowing that you loved me; knowing that we, Liam, you and I were a family.” 
“I do love you! You fathered my son Lucian and for that I will always love you.”
”You took my happiness away, Lea.”
“Not willingly, you knew! You knew that I could not love you! I only offered my friendship!” 
He ignores me as he turns back to the open field and I scream, struggling like mad against the biting hold of the soldiers as he places Liam on the very ledge of the parapets.
“No! No! Please God, No!” Liam begins to cry as panic overtakes me, rendering me weak.
“Mama! Mama!”
“Shhhh…” Lucian leans over to kiss Liam’s cheek in an attempt to calm him.
“Because you have taken my happiness away I think it is only fitting if I take away yours, let us both live in misery.”

He is insane!
It all happens so fast. In a slow and creeping haze I hear your voice from off the distance shouting orders. And then the arrows rain, chaos breaks loose as though Pandora’s Box has been lifted open. I know not how you have managed to get at this very point but I did not care. Surged with a pounding force to reach my son I use your distraction and manage to detangle myself from the soldiers and with speed I do not know I have I run to the ledge seconds before Lucian can push him over. I yank on his arm, tugging his small, shaking body to me as we fall backwards, my body breaking his fall.
“Lealin!” I lift my head and through the chaos I see Salyn’s fiery red head, quickly he signals for me to run to him and I need no other incentive as I rise to my feet, cradling Liam to my chest I dodge through a barrage of arrows and corpses littering the stone floor and run to him.
“Lea!” Lucian’s bellow causes me to turn to find the sickening image of you on your knees. Bloodied and wounded the tip of Lucian’s sword at your throat. Salyn rushes towards you, but Lucian’s warning stops him in his tracks. 
“Come to me, Lea and I will let him go!” the arrows have temporarily seized. 
“Do not listen to him, Lealin! Salyn, get her out of here, NOW!”
“Will you be content to live the rest of your life knowing you could’ve saved the love of your life, your soul mate as it were, and failed to do so? Can you live with yourself? Come to me and I promise to cease this war! I will take you and Liam and we will be away from here, I promise you.”
“Stop listening to him, Lea! I’ll be fine! Take your son and get the hell out!” the sword presses further into the flesh of your throat.
“I would shut it if I were you.” Lucian warnes.
“You promise?”
“Lealin!”
“On my life.”

“Let him go and I am yours.”

Ask me what I wouldn’t do for you Marik and I would respond with nothing.  There is nothing in this world that I would not do for you. I see you so battered and wounded, the once mighty king of a healing nation reduced to your knees before the very bane of your existence and I cannot help but find the fault in myself. All this is happening partially because of me and I wish you know how sorry I am. From the fatigued depths of my soul I truly am sorry my love. I had never wanted this for us, this strife, this war…all this is so wrong. The bodies of men litter the floor, drenched in pools of blood. They may have been our enemies, but never would I wish this upon them, no one deserves this, to fight for a nonsensical cause and defend a psychotic usurper hell bent on possessing that which does not belong to him, it’s all so wretchedly sad. 
If I must go to Lucian in order to put a stop to this nightmare than I do so willingly. With my son at my hip, I tenderly hold his head to my shoulder to keep away the frightening images of bloodied men splayed about and slowly I set one sandaled foot in front of the other and make my way to his side. Your words, your pleading, your curses and finally your threats fall deaf upon my ears; I will not listen, because if I do my resolve will crumble.
Half way to my destination I lick my lips, my heart aching from the stress. “Release him and I will come to you.”
“Do you not trust me?”
“No, not at all. Please, let him go.”
“Always the martyr?” 
“Better a martyr than a monster.”
“Very well…” still visibly in peril, he holds the sword to your body and instructs you to rise. I watch as he pushes you forward with the insistent prod of his sword and with great reluctance you walk towards me. I wish to run into your arms and never let go, I wish to cradle Liam between us and bestow teary kisses until you whisper for me to stop. I wish I could hold Fintan and Cairan and see their happy faces. The tears come and I bite down on my lower lip to cease its relentless tremble. We are so close now, yet the chasm that separates us is far too wide. I refuse to look at you, to stare into that can read my soul and instead focus on Lucian.

Too soon, I am at his side and before I have a moment to blink or even breathe properly Liam is wrenched from my grasp a dagger at his throat! My panic stricken gaze travels to you and I see you holding a perfectly strung bow and arrow targeted at Lucian, Lucian and my son! Dear merciful heavens!
“Lea, run to me! NOW! ”
“Run to him and lose your precious son!” 
“How can you do this? This is our child! Our flesh and blood!! Please Lucian! Give him to me please…” what choice do I have? How has it come to this? My darling son struggling and weeping within his own father’s arm begging me to save him! How can fate be so cruel? 
“Tell him to leave this land…take his army and leave and our son will remain in perfect health.”
The choice is made for me even before I can speak. “Marik, please I beg you, take your army and leave. I choose to stay with Lucian, he is my husband and my place is by his side with our son.”
“Don’t ask me to do this, Lealin!”
“Mama!” 
“Marik, please!” you look positively torn and I am so sorry that it has come down to this. My child or you my love?  
“I will come back for you! I promise you that!” And then you’re signaling for Salyn to watch your back as you reluctantly turn around to leave. 
I do not see the flying daggers until it is too late. The blades lanced the air and headed for Lucian and Liam! I do not think, only react as my body propels forward, slamming into both father and son with enough force to push them both to the ground. Momentarily dazed I blink twice before I stagger to my knees and scramble to where they have landed.  
“Liam?” I detach his body from Lucian’s grasp and bring him to my lap.
“Liam?” I gently shake him, my heart in my throat as I feel something wet and sticky on my fingers. 
“Liam?” he was so still, too still. “Liam? Wake up for, my love…open your eyes for Mama…” the color, he has no color in his cheeks. There is a soul wrenching scream and as I slowly sway with my innocent son on my lap and I know it came from me, deep and achingly horrid sobs wrack my body as I shamelessly weep.
“L-liam…p-please! Open your eyes for me, love.” This cannot be! It wasn’t supposed to be this way! The world goes on but I am ignorant to it all. I hear the screams and still I sway with my son in my arms. I do not know how long I stay in this position but too soon I feel a hand on my shoulder. I turn to find those horrific blue eyes. This is all his fault, my son is dead because of him! Fury, unadulterated fury clouds my judgment and I bask it, allow it to overtake every bit of me and as I settle Liam’s body on the ground I jump upon him like a woman possessed. 
I punch, and claw and slap and punch again and again and again, utterly mindless. I am unaware I am doing, but I know the darkness has won. It envelops me completely and I fall deeply into its embrace, losing what little bit of sanity I have. I do not remember grasping the sword, but heavens, I am merciless with it. Blood splatters, coating my hands and my face and still I continue to hack away until finally I am dragged away from the blood and guts that was once a living, breathing human being.